Better than Zbrush?

#21

modo and blender sculpts are nothing when it’s about millions of polygons…with ZBrush my latest character was about 18 millions of polygons…modo was almost broken with few hundred thousands of polygons…

#22

ya, the reason Mudbox and ZBrush can get that high are because MB uses the GPU and ZBrush doesn’t use a traditional 3D drawing engine. None of the other basic OpenGL apps can handle large scenes unless 3D Coat 3 does scupting on the card like Mudbox.

#23

I just got Mudbox yesterday as I need it for a project. I already had ZBrush, and have rarely come up with anything worth my time or the price of the software. The viewport is really odd if you are used any other 3D app (except maybe Modo), the acclaimed subtool feature drives me crazy when for some reason it suddenyl redraws my whole model in the veiwport rather than making a stroke. If you dont time your buttons just right on your tablet you will end up having your model as a little speck in your viewport (it took me a minute to figure out the whole staggered click zoom feature). But if you are willing to bear the pain you can yield amazing results, and for a cheap (as in price) app like that, it is defintely worth the money you pay.

HOWEVER, I needed a quick answer and something that would jump into my 3DS Max based pipeline without a hitch or hiccup (ZBrush spits in Max’s face most of the time). I needed it for penguin like feet and other body parts that will be reacting with hair, fur and can also tolerate being modified to softbodies. I tried with ZBrush and found it to be a dismal failure topologically, as well as regarding pipeline speeds and an optimized workflow with Max (or Maya for that matter). Dont get me wrong, ZBrush is a fun weekend warrior, but when it comes to the nitty gritty, down and dirty production lines (at least mine), MudBox is the way to go (at least until Pixologic releases a full 3D app that understands the garbled language ZBrush speaks).

For speed and efficiency, as well as a LOGICAL workflow definately go with Mdbox.

For a bulked up many feature app that can run on a hobbyist machine, go with ZBrush.

It all depends on your demand, industry, budget and staff. Big studios use ZBrush becaues they can staff it, it is popular with a huge community, and they can afford the learning curve. Little unemployed freelancers looking to pay the bills until they can get a staff job look to Mudbox for its quick integration with already established pipelines as well as its logical, intuitive UI and workflow.

I could go on all night, so I will stop here.

  • Evan
#24

Regarding polygon count, Wayne has a video comparing Zbrush and Mudbox. Just scroll down to the last video:

http://www.mudboxhub.com/index.php?pageid=QuickStart%20(lot2)

Mudbox wins if you want the short answer.

The funny thing about this whole sculpting with a brush thing is that it used to better for non-detailed organic work. Maya Artisan was quite difficult to control for fine detail. If anyone remembers Amorphium, that was a dissapointment too. It took until version 3 of zbrush for me to actually investigate brush sculpting again. The main reason why I like mudbox more than zbrush is the interface. However, I don’t understand why others say that Mudbox’s interface is very similar to Maya. I could just as easily say that it is similar to photoshop.

#25

I’ll check the video. But it’s a biased statement that mudbox wins. I had recently more than 120 million polygons in ZBrush, in the form of subtools. Each of them were over 10 millions of polygon. But I realize that it’s a mudbox thread, so I would be very disappointed if not mudbox would win here. By the way, to get a decent polycount you need a more than decent videocard, while ZBrush will live happily with your old |GeForce 6600 card :slight_smile:

And if you consider video as a reference compared to personal experience, then go and check GoZ and Spotlight videos on ZBcentral. Worth a look.

And as a closing to my comment, I’m pretty sure that mudbox vs zbrush is just like pencil vs charcoal. Both are artist tools, and their strength depend a lot on the artist using them

#26

If you watched the video, he was talking about a specific kind of polygon count. I was saying that it won in that video test and not generally. He tried to subdivide a model to 31 million polygons and zbrush crashed. I was just trying to balance the view that zbrush can handle higher ‘polygons’. With apps like zbrush and mudbox, ‘polygon’ is an ambiguous term, so it isn’t easy to say which program can handle more polygons unless we get specific about what kind of ‘polygons’ we talking about.

#27

Actually I DID subdivided beyond 40 millions, without crash. It was slow, sure, but didn’t crashed. And to Wayne is not an accredited ZBrush tester, since he is a devoted mudbox user. I crashed mudbox with only 8 million polys, but I would not be accredited mudbox tester since I devoted to ZBrush :slight_smile:

Comparing is senseless, each has its strength and weakness as well.

Happy SCULPTING

#28

Nah I just wrote the longest and most in depth book on zbrush lol. (Larger than the other 2 that were out at the time put together, so I think its safe to say that stands for something lol) So I know the app very very well indeed. I also used zbrush for quite a few years and was certainly no novice at it…far fomr it in fact.

In that video I say (I’m pretty sure more than once, but correct me if I’m wrong) for people to try the test themselves, because there is no such thing as an unbiased oppinion. I’ve used both apps in anger , I’ve released a fair few dvd’s on both apps over the years and soon will have a book out on each app. Do I count myself as unbiased? Hell no… everyone has a preference, although I would say that I am an idependant person, the only person who pays my wages is me.

That video was made as I was sick to death of the ‘facts’ passed out that mudbox couldn’t handle as many polys as zbrush…period…thats its sole motivation. To show that some ‘facts’ were nothing of the such kind and were purely pixo marketing talk. I wanted to show some facts as opposed to marketing talk. Its also why I wanted everyone who had the ability to, to run the tests themselves.

The fact that not one person at the time (That vid was made some months back…probably back end of 08) produced a video that said ‘hey it doesn’t do that for me’ spoke volumes. The only person you can belive about whether an app is good or bad for you, is yourself and your own expeiences. Find the most you can out about 2 apps and give them both a fair go for the same ammount of time. That way you are ensured the facts you need.

Wayne…

#29

I started using ZBrush again with GoZ, which is not without bugs but it’s good. If I want to use Zbrush for sculpting since it’s much faster with high-poly scenes, but want to do model painting in Mudbox, how can I get the low and high-res meshes into Mudbox? Everything I’ve tried just destroys the high res mesh.

#30

i recommend installing, and trying them both…

after this is done i recommend uninstalling mudbox and using a superior program aka zbrush

#31

Id also recomend using a mac, and getting your brain wired up backwards just after uninstalling mudbox. :stuck_out_tongue: See how easy this smart-alec stuff is.

Horses for courses, I got a 1gb ati. Mudbox for me leaves zbrush in the dirt.
When they were on my other machine that has a 512mb ati and has a slower chip, they were about even though mudbox dont crash and trash my work.
On this old athlon 2700 with 3gig of ram zbrush never crashed and it was slightly more responsive than mudbox.
Depends on what system you have, depends on your pipline or lack of (other software to be used with zbrush or mudbox). And depends on how you take to using the programs. Im more fluent in zbrush than mud, but can’t stand all the hoop jumping in it to do the same tasks. For me the bells and whistles are not important, I wanna sculpt and paint export, end of story. So for me, mudbox is better.

#32

Don’t know which one is better. I’ve only really messed with them to get experience in case I ever needed to use one for money.

My results?

I spent the whole Zbrush trial worrying more about viewport navigation than making anything. Although the last day of the trial I did finally manage to make a pretty cool little frog.

I made two excellent normal/bump maps for some of my models in my first evening of Mudbox use. (an asteroid, and a creature head)

I’m a Maya guy and I’d be seriously inclined to buy MB over using their in-house copy of ZB if an employer ever needed me for high detail stuff.

Now to be fair, I tried ZB when I first started using Maya and I just recently tried MB and at this point in time I do have considerably more comfort in 3d space.

#33

To me mudbox was a total disaster. That’s my experience, so I thnk that I’ll respect your opinion, I hope you respect mine. It’s not that we have to decide what is the best software, it’s about what fits the best to you.
I admit, that for a 3D guy MB has better UI, but for me ZB had a better UI (I’m a strange guy), I feel more comfortable with ZB, just putting my tablet into my lap, and just sculpt, sculpt, and sculpt…

It’s up to the artist to decide what is the best…for him\her. There are no absolute opinion, just subjective.

#34

wait until august, when zbrush 4 comes out, and then decide

#35

that is VERY good advice as there’s 30day demo’s of zbrush and mudbox and a 15 day demo of 3dcoat as well…so you can try out the demo’s in the mean time then re asses once the new version of zbrush is showcased in siggraph 2009 in August.

#36

Interesting thread here! :curious:

   For what it may be worth, I'll add a small fraction of my two cents to the mix as well.

   I love ZB, but it drives me nuts, when I try to use character work in other apps due to the warped perspective. Hence I use Mudbox (v1, mind you. MB2009 is a total disaster in my book as well) for all my silhouette and contour work, then I step over to ZB for everything that does not require proper perspective. I find ZB's tools a lot more intuitive for creative/design sculpts, but its' warped perspective is the only limitation that keeps me going back to MBv1. Admittedly, MB has a much easier learning curve, but once you get your head around ZB, its not a big deal. There's really only three things I want from ZB4: "correct perspective, higher polycount and paint layers", everything else is icing on the cake. It's a really great toolset otherwise, offering a lot more flexibility than Mudbox.
   
   In regards to polycount, this is not exactly a simple issue. I was also able to divide a full human character up to 48 Million polys in ZB, but it was very slow. The limitation here seems to be ZB's RAM usage. Interestingly I was not able to get the same character mesh up that high in MB2009, since the imported mesh is not really low poly and MB2009 could not handle it. A really low poly start-out mesh divides much higher in MB2009 though, but the broken flat-shaded mode makes work on silhouette and contour a real pain in the butt. As a matter of fact the latter inconvenience is one of the reasons I am not using MB2009 at all, but the workflow described in the previous paragraph. 

The way things look, I probably wont upgrade to MB2010, regardless of what they claim it can do, since the current release is so full of bugs and broken features, it can easily be called a beta-version.
  
  I'd also recommend to wait for ZB4 and then make a decision.
   
   Cheers!

PS: Btw, I’d recommend looking into Wayne’s ZB book. While not as “production-oriented” as Scott Spencer’s in regards to character work, it’s very comprehensive and informative!

#37

I bought Mudbox on Mac after being treated as a second-class citizen by Pixologic for the best part of a year. I’ve since achieved more in Mudbox than I ever did with ZBrush - I get disp’ and texure maps out really easily, and for the most part Mudbox is stable and user-friendly. I don’t really need many more features than Mudbox 2009 offers, but I’d certainly like to see a service pack to iron out the few rough edges.

I suspect at least one poster on this thread knows what coming in Mudbox 2010, but no-one’s letting on!

For me ZBrush is a amazing, but it’s like a V12 sportscar with the brakes and wheels off a hatchback: loads of power but rubbish control.

#38

ya, after playing with GoZ for a bit, I’m back to Mudbox after being unable to get ZBrush to make a normal map without visible seams. Mudbox doesn’t choke on my UV Layout tweaked UVs - I have no idea why ZBrush so demands that you have some lame AUV tiles (that don’t have any relation to object space) or whatever. Pretty lame.

My only complaint is that on my Mac Pro with Geforce GTX 285, ZBrush is a bajillion times faster for high-res sculpting since it uses all 8 hyperthreaded cores and Mudbox uses the GPU, which is badly limited by Nvidia bad Mac drivers. I get 105 FPS on a scene with the Radeon 4870 (and 95 FPS with the 3870) but the GTX 285 gets 40 FPS and sculpting on anything over a million polygons is slow compared to the 4870. Nvidia is apparently looking into it (being a reviewer in the press gets your problems surprisingly good attention…)

#39

My only complaint is that on my Mac Pro with Geforce GTX 285, ZBrush is a bajillion times faster for high-res sculpting since it uses all 8 hyperthreaded cores and Mudbox uses the GPU, which is badly limited by Nvidia bad Mac drivers.

For once I can totally relate to you, but as we’re both avid Maya users I think you can understand when I say: Get a Quadro.

On my homestation, Mud gets a bit sloppy after 5 or 6 subdivisions (Geforce 7950GT) but on my workstation, using a rather low-end Quadro, it is devastating. No problem pushing a skrillion polys and at the full framerate (70+) too.

I’ll third or tenth the Mudbox over Zbrush vote though, but must give my “props” to Mudbox 2009. Coming from Maya, Mudbox makes Zbrush look like an old-school Windows 98 application. It’s almost silly to go back, and yes I remember Amorphium… One of my very first 3D apps, and one of the ones that got me started!

Edit: Wait, nevermind. I spoke too soon (again). We both know your card rocks, it’s just the drivers that suck. Sorry about that. Perhaps try running it in Win7 and see if it’s any different for you?

#40

there was a thread already here that talked about the Quadro vs gaming cards. The verdict: Mudbox is the worst for Mudbox since it relies heavily on GLSL shaders that are very game-like so the Geforce drivers are much better. I had a Quadro FX 5600 and it was crap for Mudbox compared to the Radeon 4870 due to lackluster Mac drivers but a Windows user said that he was also disappointed with the Quadro relative to the Geforce with MB. Nvidia is sending me a Quadro FX 4800 to review and I’ll post a link to the review likely showing the same thing. The 4800 is just a 5600 with less power consumption and CUDA cores.